Welcome to The Island Of The Misfit Hams! If this is your first visit, you must register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed [in the upper right hand corner].

If you are an amateur radio operator, you must sign up with your licensed callsign as your username. Anonymous registrations will likely be denied. If you are not a ham radio operator, but have a strong interest in the hobby, please feel free to use the 'contact us' link [in the lower right hand corner] to make arrangements for gaining access to the site.

YABA (Yet Another Boat Anchor)

Don't know if this rig plus accessories can really be classed as such...but I finally got hold of one of my "Grail" radios. Actually, a pair of them plus several accessories.

A little back story is in order, one supposes: I've always liked the Yaesu 'two-meter' product lines. That is, FT-726R (of which I own several), the FT-980 (ditto) and the FT-One (which has nice styling but is troublesome to maintain). The other rig of this genre I didn't have is an FT-102. Over Christmas I managed to score an FV-102, FC-102 and several SP-102s so that put me on the hunt.

One bazillion scammers later I managed to connect with a gent who actually had a rig plus a second FC-102; he was the original owner of the radio. During this time I was in contact with Mal, NC4L about buying another from one of his customers; that radio is now in his queue for updates.

Now, to rearrange the shack to accommodate the new arrivals. I'll probably keep one inline and the other as a backup. George and John, be listening for me on 75/40/10M AM - I'll have a whole 150-200w to work with there.

"Everyone wants to be an AM Gangsta until it's time to start doing AM Gangsta shit."

My first store bought rig was a FT-227R. Got it at Henry Radio. I think they were on Beach Blvd or Ball road, no wait Ball road was the Heathkit store. I still like Yaesu, my mobile rig is a FT-100. But I do have a Icom IC-720a as my boat anchor. Your FT-102, that's a early 80s vintage?

I thought religions were prophet based organizations.
What do you mean I am out of money? I still have checks!
Remember, amateurs built the Ark, professionals built the Titanic

Yes - '83-'84 time frame. Same with the FT-980, '726R. The latter two have gotten a bad rap due to noisy or fast-tuning synthesizers - but honestly, I really don't see a problem with either. Maybe if I was in an environment with much higher adjacent channel/out-of-band RF levels, though at my current place they hear just fine.

Interesting bit about the '980: Its 1st IF scheme (including conversion frequencies, IF shift and filtering) is the same as the FT-90x series. The '90x is no slouch in the receiver department, and putting a '980 side-by-side on a crowded band, I really can't hear any difference in the recovered signals - intermod, synthesizer hash or otherwise.

For those times when I have to have a high-end, amateur-bands-only receiver I'll gravitate to the '102.

"Everyone wants to be an AM Gangsta until it's time to start doing AM Gangsta shit."

If you look to my picture you will see the black radio is a National NC-101X ham band receiver and its matching speaker. Circa 1934. It was a cool radio to operate, a little drifty but not as bad as most of that era. Pic was taken at "the flea at MIT".

I thought religions were prophet based organizations.
What do you mean I am out of money? I still have checks!
Remember, amateurs built the Ark, professionals built the Titanic

The Malcolmized FT-102 arrived today. It's going to have some rather interesting company in the form of its chief competitor: The TS-830S. I managed to get ahold of a Gold Label version that looks almost new, along with a couple of SP-230 speakers and a VFO-230.

There's a bit of history with me and the Kenwood hybrids. In the early 80s a buddy of mine traded a TS-520S to me for some boat-anchorish equipment (Gonset GSB-100, Hammarlund HQ-100, Realistic DX-160, etc). He didn't need it because he'd just bought a TS-830S and wanted some nostalgia around the radio room in addition to the modern (at the time) gear. A couple of years later, I ended up with his '830 as payment for house renovations.

The year afterward (35 years ago this month, to be exact) I sold both Kenwoods to finance the purchase of my first street motorcycle. Ham radio went by the wayside for several years then returned in the form of a TS-820S plus accessories. I've had that particular '820 since 1987 and have modded it for WARC transception; in 1989 I added an R-820 to the lineup and they've been in almost non-stop service ever since.

Both top-end hybrids have been on my mind for a number of years and the purchase of each set of gear started off with an acquisition of the remote, synthesized VFO - the hardest accessory piece to locate with either line. It's always fun to do A/B comparisons with my TS-820S/R-820 setup and one of my FT-90x rigs, and a '102/'830 shootout will be enjoyable as well.

Ironically, I bought an AT-230 tuner at one of our local hamfests not long after acquiring the TS-820S. I'd thought about selling the thing many times over the years but kept it around for whatever reason...probably to justify completing an '830 station.

Last edited by N8YX; 04-25-2018 at 05:46 PM.
Reason: Grammar

"Everyone wants to be an AM Gangsta until it's time to start doing AM Gangsta shit."